Category: Australia – Western Australia

Today’s itinerary included the Devil’s Marbles. We arrived around 10am with only a few vehicles around. In the time we were there, several bus loads arrived and departed – at least 2 cycles worth. This is one of the main reasons it is best to travel on your own – you aren’t tied to their schedule. We all went our separate ways exploring – there were boulders everywhere. I did the classic trail, Mike crossed over the road to get to more isolated areas, and the boys climbed – everything in site. It was fun for all.

The marbles are formed from an ancient rock plane which cracked and split linearly, and then weathered all around to leave circular forms. There were balanced rocks, split rocks, flaked rocks and bridges. These aren’t small rocks either – as you can see from the one we are ‘resting’ in. All very awesome and making you once again appreciate the power of nature.

Also at the site were plaques explaining the local wildlife. Beyond the normal roos and wallabies, the more unique includes a frog which is only active when water arrives. When the water dries up, it fills its body with water, then burrows under the water hole, hibernates, and survives for many months on the water it absorbed when active. There is a crab which is very similar.

The boys and I returned to the van and made lunch and eventually worried about Mike. Pat went on a recognizance trip with no luck, then another with success. Naturally, Mike was just photoing! Mike ate and we headed further down the road – more interesting rocks – and then we were back on the road by about 1 pm.

After a short stop in Tennant Creek for some shopping (and a chat with a lady who recommended a stay at Daly Waters roadhouse), we pushed on. We did not want to drive in the dark again, but managed to push on to stop in by Newcastle Waters – an abandoned town. The town was on the main route prior to the building of the Stuart Highway, and it was a key station in the cattle droving. There were many articles on the walls of the old hotel from the papers, and the were plaques of all the drovers from the station. The town was abandoned in 1988, and now only one home is occupied.

We managed to get to Daly Waters before dark, but just. They had no powered sites left, but that was okay. We booked a ‘Beef and Barro’ dinner (Pat just beef, Mike just barro, Kyle and I ½ & ½) for 8pm. Before dinner we had a browse around the bar and caught some of the entertainment before dinner. Once again the bar was full of items left by visitors. These included many bras, panties, hats, police badges, emergency worker badges, shirts (one Canadian map on a shirt left just a week prior), many flags, coins, paper money and anything else a traveler could part with to leave a memento. The boys had fun spotting Canadian content – I think there was more of that then American for sure – even some Canadian Tire money!

The place was packed, but we finally found a table right up front at the speakers. The star of the show was a country singer whose side kick was his Silky Barrow Chickens. He presented them as eagles, but they were just chooks (another Aussie-ism for you). They sat up at the stage with him for the entire show, and even ended up on his head during our dinner set. The younger ones wandered around and pecked on stage or even in between some of the front tables. He also had a homemade map shaped guitar. When he took his breaks, there was a comedian (the pub owner), and guitar player (a local rodeo star) who filled in the gaps. All in all an entertaining and fun night and a very yummy dinner.

And this time we all took advantage of the showers before heading off for Katherine the next morning!

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And then it was time to go home. We all felt that we had our fill of travel for the time being, so decided just to drive home with no further tourist sites. Given the distance, we had one overnight to do. We left Coral Bay early for the longest day of driving. Since both Mike and I have bad backs, we stop about every 90 minutes to stretch and swap drivers which has worked well. Drivers passing by must wonder what we are up to as we do our yoga sun stretches :-). We made a short stop in Carnarvon to book a room in Geraldton for the night (very helpful info staff) and had an early lunch at Chicken Treet (first time trying a chicken shop). Then back on the road. Did not make any further meal stops – just swaps till we got to Geraldton.

Despite having booked and paid for our room ahead, when we arrived they told us there no rooms available due to a mix up. After some shuffling around, we did eventually get settled. But only after we had to move rooms after having poured a glass of wine and unpacking the eskie (that’s a cooler mate).

That evening we were lucky to catch an interview with Bill Bryson on TV which was timely given we were just finishing his book on tape ‘The Thunderbolt Kid’. As I mentioned previously the books on tape are a great success and something we will definitely repeat for our July trip in the camper van drive from Alice Springs to Darwin.

The next day we were at last homeward bound – just one stop in Gingin at the honey farm for more honey, honey ice cream & pollen. En route Mike stopped and captured some of the sights which have been typical on the drive – the windmills and roadside fruit/veggie stands.

We also stopped by the Leaning Trees of Greenough. They are quite fascinating – this is just a couple of them, but there are many. The tree trunks grow horizontally due to the salt winds off the Indian Ocean.

And so we arrived back home with a couple of days to spare in the break to give Mike and Kyle time to catch up on school work and get organized.

As for me, I’m pretty much like the trees of Greenough and continue to take life in a relaxed pose.

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We rose to a very overcast morning with high winds. We weren’t quite sure if the tour would run – there were rumblings around the camp that some tours were not going out. But we packed up hopefully and headed over anyway. The Whale Shark tours go out past the reef – and their tours were being decided upon still – but the Manta Rays come inside the reef and so our tour did run (that’s our boat at left). The boats are assisted by spotter planes to direct them to the rays/sharks.

Although it was still windy, the sky soon cleared and we ended up with good weather after all (ho hum, another beautiful day). The spotter plane had little luck at first – and even when he finally spotted a ray, we lost it almost directly once we got there. But they finally found another one, and we all got in the water to check it out.

It turned out we had found a ray who was visiting a cleaning station. We all had a nice long swim with it as it hovered around. The water was quite churned up due to the winds, and the manta was mostly down fairly deep, but it did come up higher on occasion. We could see the cleaner fish working over its body and the larger fish swimming along by it also. It was very majestic and smooth. We were at the surface floundering around to try to stay put, and it just glided around effortlessly. It was an incredible experience!

Next we headed over to see some green ocean turtles in an area where they come up to breathe and feed in the shallows (out deep – just in the midst of the outer reef). The turtles were a variety of sizes, some very large; close to metre in diameter. They were fast though! They would come up for a quick breath or two, and then they were gone. Hard to catch on film.

We also spotted dolphins en route – a group of 4. There were 2 mothers and 2 calves, feeding in the shallow water. It is easier for the small dolphins to fish in the shallows, so the mothers bring them there to teach them to fish.

We then headed over to a section of the outer reef for snorkeling. We all (3 of us that is – actually all of the boat less one fellow who was nervous of the sharks) did the more challenging swim with the guide. We first visited the area where the reef sharks come for cleaning – there were a couple of big ones there. 

Sorry – no photos of the sharks this round. It really is amazing swimming near these creatures. One or two of the reef sharks are okay to be round, but when they start to accumulate in numbers (as they did at Lakeside on our previous snorkel), it does become a bit unnerving – and we would take off. But here there were only a couple and it was intriguing to watch them get cleaned.

We then swam across a ‘canyon’ in the coral where the tide currents were a bit stronger, but the reef was spectacular. It was great to see the variety of coral on the outer reef especially – there were many different types here from what is in the inner reef.

The fish out here somehow seemed brighter also – but that was perhaps my imagination.

All in all it was great day – one of the best for sure. I think we got great value for our money given that we spent $140 pp for this vs. $360 pp for a whale shark swim (by the way – they did end up going out on rough seas, and they did get to swim with one – but it was not smooth!)

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We packed up and took the short-ish drive headed to Coral Bay. We took an unscheduled detour into one of the gorges on the way. It was a very nice surprise.

Charles Knife canyon was about an 11km drive into the gorge. The route in was spectacular. We must have stopped 20 times up and down to admire the view and take photos. In the photo above you can see Kyle on the right if you look closely (you may need to check out the enhanced image in the gallery!).  It was mid day and the lighting was not perfect for photos, but hopefully they will still capture the dimensions even in the harsher light.

Once finally at the destination, we were a bit disappointed in the view – but the views on the drive up made it worth the journey at any rate.

We had managed to find Cindy in Exmouth, and once in Coral Bay, we also managed to locate Jeeza (a teacher with Mike) despite the privacy concerns of the park staff who would not reveal his location! We had a swim in the ocean to cool off, booked a Manta Ray tour for Monday for the 3 of us, and did a bit of groceries. On the walk back from the shops, Kyle and I were treated to a visit by the local lizard. – he’s about 4 feet long. He sauntered over to where the sprinklers were running and paused under a tree for a cool down – it was very hot by the afternoon.

Looking forward to a chance to get out onto the ocean tomorrow to see the reef life further out.

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Kyle had been feeling under the weather for much of the trip. Given his general discomfort when driving, it could be that, or it could be something he is fighting – at any rate, he decided to stay home for the day and read while we ventured out (or maybe he just wanted a break from us :-).

So Mike & I headed off for another snorkel. We took a drive back to the reef side of the point, and decided to visit a couple of other sites first.

Again we spotted several wild emus. These ones were much less accustomed to humans and scurried away as soon as we left the car. We paid a visit to a local shipwreck (after a couple of wrong turns to other interesting spots). The ship was a cattle ship which wrecked around the turn of the century (1901 that is). It was salvaged for wood to build local houses, and then was used for bombing practice during the second world war. We then checked out a point to see the lighthouse, then to lakeside for a snorkel.

Lakeside was a bit more effort to get to, but was worth it. We had to travel a few hundred metres up shore from the parking lot. All along the way the beach was covered in jellyfish. The winds had shifted and they were being blown in shore. There were lots in the water too, but once you got out into the reef they were not as dense. Despite the numbers, we were extra careful and only Mike got stung, just once. 

At one point, all the fish in the area where I was swimming darted in away. I decided not to find out why and followed them. Mike meanwhile was over a bit and caught the cause for concern – a large reef shark had come in. Reef sharks pose no threat to humans, but still trigger the natural response to a shark . Once you let your brain take over, it’s neat to watch them cruise. Actually, the reef is so healthy here that most of the fish don’t panic much when the shark approaches – they just saunter away.

Again there was lots of diversity of fishes. Puffer fish were quite common (photo’d in the gallery). The little fluorescent blue ones which we had seen in Turquoise Bay were common here also.  There were some larger fish also – may have been mulloway (same as we saw caught off the jetty in Carnarvon).  We also spotted several rays – you have to be careful closer to shore since they blend in with the sand and you have to watch not to step on them (they sting).

Having snorkeled the Great Barrier Reef it is difficult not to constantly make comparisons. I really had expected the experience to be the same – but am surprised at how different it is at Ningaloo. We are lucky to have seen both to see the diversity.

And after a fair amount of searching, I finally found our anemone and clown fish. They are different here than the Great Barrier Reef, so it took me a while to spot them. These are tomato clowns and the anemone are much shorter and duller in colour. But their behaviour is the same – the clowns hover around the anemone for protection and anytime a threat comes near, they hunker down into the anemone.

We’ve decided that after our 2 days in Coral Bay, we’ll head back to Mandurah – we’re getting vacation saturated 🙂 But for tomorrow it’s off to Coral Bay and more adventures!

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